Duane Allman and slide guitar. To many devotees of Duane's
playing with and
without the Allman Brothers, the two will forever be
inseparable. Duane's
slide style had an unmistakable identity that was solely his
own, and he
possessed one of the most fluid and expressive bottleneck sounds
around.
Eric Clapton, when asked about his own slide playing in his
August '76 Guitar Player interview, responded: "I think what really got me
interested
in it as an electric approach was seeing Duane take it to
another place.
There were very few people playing electric slide that were
doing anything
new; it was just Elmore James licks, and everyone knows those.
No one was
opening it up until Duane showed up and played it a completely
different
way. That sort of made me think about taking it up."

The Slide

Countless objects can be used as slides: Bottle necks, socket
wrenches, pill
bottles, knives, and brass tubing (my favorite) are just some of the objects
that have
been seen in the hands of slide players. When choosing a slide,
it is
important to have something with ample weight so you don't have
to press
down too hard on the strings, risking a lot of fret and
fingerboard noise.
In other words, the slide's own weight should help carry it
along. Duane
almost always used Coricidin bottles, and Lord knows they worked
for him.
However, the aspiring slide player should be forewarned about a
couple of
drawbacks to this type of slide. First, it really doesn't have
the proper
weight to get a truly clean, loud sound (keep in mind that Duane
played very
loud with the Allman Brothers, mainly utilizing Les Pauls and
Marshall
amps). Also, this slide was shorter than the width of all six
strings,
making full chording and lower licks on the slide quite
difficult to
execute. Lastly, this type of slide has a closed-off end, and it
can get
awfully stuffy in there for your finger. You also lose the
ability to use
the tip of you finger, which, if exposed, can let you know where
the end of
the slide is for more accurate playing.

Try a
few types before you decide on the right slide for you. This
photo illustrates the proper slide position on the pinky (or on
the ring finger if you want total Duane accuracy), with the tip
of the finger exposed. Note the fingers touching the strings
behind the slide to damp out any overtones created by the slide.
This slide is the brass type I prefer:

Symbols

We'll be using some
special symbols to indicate what your slide should do. This
means that you slide up to that note from approximately
two frets below it without giving the original position of the
slide any real time value:

This means the same thing,
only this time you slide down to the note from
approximately two frets above:

And this means you pick
only the first note and then slide to the next, giving both
their notated time value:

Open Tunings

Duane's favorite tunings were open
G [D, G, D, G, B, and D, low to high]
and open E [E, B, E, G#, B, E, low to high]. These are two of the most popular open tunings
for slide
guitar, with the latter being more reminiscent of the days of
the acoustic
Delta blues artists such as Robert Johnson and Son House. Open
E
is more
represented in the later playing of Chicago bluesmen such as
Elmore James
and Tampa Red, who were important in bridging the gap between
the rural and
the hotter urban styles.

Each
tuning has what I call a "box" pattern: an area that, due to the
new tuning of the guitar, puts the notes of a blues scale within
a closer proximity of each other. You'll see what I mean in this
example of the open (utilizing open strings) and closed (no open
strings) box patterns for an E tuning. (Remember that the
slide should be positioned directly over the guitar's
frets:

Here are the two box
positions for open G tuning. Note how the movement and
arrangement of notes are just like E tuning, except moved
one string higher:

Standard Tuning Slide

Duane played slide in
standard tuning quite often. In fact, on some recordings it's a
bit hard to decipher any difference between his work in open or
standard tunings. One way to be really sure is to listen for any
moment where a full group of notes are struck that are
definitely not in standard tuning. For instance, the high
E, B, and G# of E tuning are giveaways, as
would be the high D, B, and G notes for open G
tuning.

Standard
tuning slide is quite difficult and rather limited due to the
lack of closer box patterns. Probably the greatest reason for
the use of this technique lies in those rare moments when you
are called upon to perform both fretted tasks (left-hand
fingering) and slide playing in the same song. This situation
has occurred more than once for me in the studio, and that's
enough for me to know that standard tuning slide should not be
taken lightly. Damping strings to prevent any notes other than
ones you're sounding to ring out is also crucial to this style,
since we are not tuned to any specific chord and therefore must
be careful not to sound any extraneous notes.

Here is
the main blues pattern Duane used for his standard tuning slide
work:

The Right Hand

Fingerpicking is essential to proper slide technique, and even
though Duane
used a flatpick for his lead playing, he always fingerpicked for
slide. I
recommend a thumb-and-three finger approach to slide playing;
this style
affords you the greatest damping capabilities so important to
clean slide
playing. Below are two examples of what I mean. In the first
exercise, your 1st, 2nd, and 3rd fingers pick the G, B,and high E strings. When the high E string is
sounded, the thumb should simultaneously come across and stop
the G and B, leaving only the high E to
ring. This is an example of how damping is done when a lick
moves in the direction of the high E string, and how
Duane achieved such a smooth, fluid approach to his playing:

If the lick moves in the
opposite direction - towards the low E string - the
fingers that played the strings should then serve to stop and
rest on the same string, if you wish to damp them out. If the
lick continues in the same direction over other strings, you
should continue to use your 1st, 2nd and 3rd fingers as a
group for playing and damping, saving your thumb for
rhythmic bass notes and damping:

Slide Licks

The following are examples
of some slide licks in the Allman style, broken down into the
categories of open E, open G, and standard
tunings. Take note of the similarities between them, as well as
their differences. Don't forget to keep the slide straight and
damp properly with your picking hand if necessary:

"Remembering
Duane"By Arlen Roth

Here is a 12-bar blues
lead slide solo in open E that I've titled "Remembering
Duane." It suggests his style and is basically a summation of
some of his most memorable work. If you haven't heard much of
Duane's playing, I would suggest listening to and absorbing as
many of his recordings as possible before continuing your slide
studies and playing this piece in the right spirit. If you want
to further your study of slide guitar, I suggest that you read
my book, Slide Guitar (Oak Publications, 33 W. 60th St.,
New York, NY 10023, or you can write to me care of Hot Licks
Instruction Tapes, 46 Warren St., New York, NY 10007). Good
luck!